


Feeling As Good As Love

by WelpThisIsHappening



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Or: seriously we're not fake dating
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-27
Updated: 2020-05-27
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:28:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24412840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WelpThisIsHappening/pseuds/WelpThisIsHappening
Summary: Emma is excited about this weekend.It's always good — this thing they do, with the house and the ocean and the friendship that seems to stand the test of time. But now, there's an added bonus. Because this year she and Killian aren't just coming to the house on the beach with that friendship moniker hanging over them. They're coming as a couple.A real couple. That kisses. Regularly. And Emma's excited about that too.She just didn't expect her friends not to believe her.
Relationships: Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan
Comments: 23
Kudos: 200





	Feeling As Good As Love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shireness](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shireness/gifts).



“You know, you don’t actually have to do this.”

Emma doesn’t let go of the plate in her hand, but her eyebrows furrow slightly and Mary Margaret actually has the gall to blush. There are soap suds on her elbow. “Wash the dishes?” Emma quips. “Nuh uh, I’m totally doing this, then I won’t have to do it the rest of the weekend.”

It’s a thing, this annual thing they do — renting a house out East, after Memorial Day, but a few weeks before the tourists descend on the Hamptons and the beaches and the vineyards on the North Fork. And it’s fun, it’s always been fun, college friends and an almost ridiculous amount of alcohol, although none of it ever comes from those vineyards on the North Fork because they’re not actually made of money. 

It’s also the first time Emma has brought someone with her. 

Kind of. 

Killian always comes with them, has been part of the _group_ for as long as she can remember, because he’s been friends with David for as long as she can remember, but this not-so-annual thing the two of _them_ are doing, is pretty new and even more exciting and she might actually be in—

They’ll get there, she’s sure.   
  
Presumably after she finishes washing the dishes. 

And once Mary Margaret stops staring at her like that.

“Ok,” Emma sighs, shaking her hair off her shoulder for fear of her own issues with soap suds. “What’s your damage?”  
  
“Are you quoting things at me?”   
  
“Yes, because I don’t understand what’s happening and when I am confused I fall back on tried and true movie quotes. So, c’mon Winona Ryder, what’s your damage?”   
  
“Her name wasn’t actually Winona Ryder in the movie,” Mary Margaret points out. 

Emma rolls her eyes. With her whole head. “I know you’re not drunk yet,” she says, “because Scarlet and Phillip aren’t back from the liquor store yet—”  
  
“—Them having to go to the liquor store at all seems to suggest that we’ve already blasted through our liquor supply. Which, you know, that’s kind of troubling. For us, as people.”   
  
“Did you say blasted?” Emma asks, and whatever sound she makes is less a laugh and more like general misunderstanding. Maybe Mary Margaret has been body-snatched. “Like that’s a genuine word you used in this real-life conversation. That the two of us are having.”   
  
“Yeah, speaking of two of us…”   
  
“Were we?”   
  
Mary Margaret grabs a glass. With maybe a bit more force than absolutely necessary, all but yanking the towel off her shoulder, and Emma’s not moving so it’s almost impressive when it feels like her mind trips over itself a bit. While trying to figure out what the hell is going on. 

There are footsteps coming towards them. 

“Ah,” Ruby says, leaning against the kitchen door frame. “Are we doing this then?”

Emma’s jaw cracks when it drops open. 

Mary Margaret grits her teeth. 

She’s totally going to break that glass. 

And that will inevitably piss off Regina. She’s the one who booked this house. AirBnB, whatever. All Emma knows is that she made sure both her and Killian’s payments were Venmo’ed to Regina almost on time and that her nearly-serious boyfriend who she might genuinely be in— _whatever_ with has a habit of over packing socks. 

Killian brought no less than twenty-four pairs of socks with him. For one weekend. Four days, three nights. With her. In one room. 

It’s the first time they’ve ever been away together. And now this is happening. Whatever this is.

“That’s not an answer,” Ruby continues, five steps and one jump until she’s perched on the edge of what may actually be a marble counter. “He’s playing some stupid video game with David, anyway, so it’s not like we’re going to be interrupted.”  
  
“What video game?” Mary Margaret asks. Neither she nor Ruby flinch when Emma throws her hands in the air. 

Soap suds land on several different cabinet doors. 

There are an obscene number of cabinets in his house. 

“They’re really serious about Mario Party,” Emma says, like it’s obvious. It kind of is. She knows for a fact that David had texted Killian about bringing his DS with him that weekend, mostly because she was lying next to him when he got the text. “And seriously—what is going on with you guys? Was this conversation preordained?”  
  
Ruby clicks her teeth. “More like a discussion was had in passing, but—” She cuts herself off when Mary Margaret’s cheeks flames. “Look at you,” Ruby accuses, “you’re not helping at all. Emma is going to think we were gossiping.”   
  
“Weren’t we?” Mary Margaret counters. 

“I mean—well, gossip is such a dirty word and this...Em, you don’t have to fake on our behalf.”

Emma blinks. Once. Then does it again. She flutters her fingers, which only leaves a bit of moisture clinging to her pants, and that’s a little annoying. Not as annoying as the prospect of her two best friends gossiping about something she still doesn’t understand, but that’s neither here nor there. 

“Say words,” she demands. “In something vaguely resembling a sentence.”

Ruby squeezes one eye shut. “It’s just—ok, we know that there are couples up here and Regina and Locksley are in the middle of full-on wedding plans, which is—you know, it’s annoying and opulent. Is that a good word?”  
  
Emma lifts her eyebrows. 

Mary Margaret’s cheeks look like they’re half a second from combusting, they’re that red. 

And Ruby isn’t done. 

“Plus, y’know me and Dor are obviously pretty fucking cute and M’s and David stare longingly at each other every moment of every day.”  
  
“That’s not true,” Mary Margaret objects, but both Ruby and Emma make near-identical sounds of disagreement and she suddenly seems very preoccupied with her feet. 

“All we’re saying,” Ruby adds, “is that we get it if you felt like you had to show up with—you know, someone special. But...this is—”  
  
“—Silly,” Mary Margaret finishes. 

Emma can’t move her eyebrows any more. If she does her actual eyes are liable to fall out, and then Regina won’t get her deposit back and that will only end badly. 

Eyeballs on the kitchen floor presumably aren’t covered in incidentals. 

“What” Emma breathes, “are you talking about?”

Ruby scrunches her nose that time. “It’s just—you and Jones? Really? Like, c’mon, if you were going to pick someone to play boyfriend, there had to be someone better.”  
  
Emma is going to have to write Regina a check for damages done to this house. Whatever rushes down her spine is a mix of sudden and rather jarring anger and complete disbelief at what she’s just heard, the words bouncing around her brain like they’ll be able to find a more legitimate order that way. 

Head on a swivel, Emma gapes at the two other people in the kitchen, dimly aware of what sounds like an exceptionally competitive round of Mario Party. 

“You can’t be serious,” Emma says, voice low and, she hopes, as threatening as possible. 

Ruby shrugs. She’s running the gamut of bodily-movement reactions, it seems. “You guys have known each other forever and now you’re going to date? You hated each other when you first met. When’s the last time you and Jones spent time together alone?”  
  
“When I spend the night at his apartment. Like last night.”

“Nah, c’mon, who do you think we are, Em? Idiots?”  
  
“Apparently,” she shouts, and there goes any sense of threat. Now she just sounds a little unhinged, the word practically snapping out of her and Mary Margaret visibly recoils. Emma pinches the bridge of her nose. “So, wait, wait, wait, let me get this straight. The two of you,” she waves an aggressive hand between them, “legitimately believe that Killian and I are faking our relationship because I feel bad that Robin and Regina are disgustingly in love?”

Mary Margaret lets out a breath, even as her eyes flit towards Ruby. “Not just them,” she reasons. “Everyone’s always kind of paired off here and you’re…”  
  
“Oh my God.”   
  
“We’re not trying to be insulting.”   
  
“And yet,” Emma grumbles, tugging her hands down either one of her cheeks and no doubt leaving angry red streaks in her wake. That’s good. She’s angry. And confused. And angry. And she’d kind of like to make out with her boyfriend. 

This was supposed to be the weekend she got to make out with her boyfriend. And tell her friends that she and Killian had been dating for months. 

There’d been a plan. 

They'd talked about it. 

Nowhere in that plan did either one of them expect their friends to think they were lying. 

That’s a confusing sentence. Emma is very confused. 

Maybe she’d been onto something with the body-snatching idea before. 

“This is insane,” she mutters, mostly to herself and at some point she’s started pacing. “This is—you know Killian and I have been dating for like..a really long time. It’s not like we’ve tried to hide it. You guys are just unobservant.”  
  
Ruby doesn’t look convinced. “Name one date you have been on.”   
  
“Excuse me?”   
  
“One date. Name one date that you have been on with Killian.”   
  
“I don’t have to prove myself to you! Or my relationship.”   
  
“And yet,” Ruby echoes, expression turning particularly pleased. Emma resists the very real urge to knock her off the counter. 

Emma screws her mouth shut, mind racing to find something really _good_ , but she hadn’t been entirely prepared for show-and-tell and the noises in the living room are actually starting to get very loud. 

Ruby makes a pitying noise in the back of her throat. 

“No, no, no,” Emma stammers, gaping at her and a still-flushed Mary Margaret. “I just—ok, ok, I had that police officer’s dinner. Two weekends ago. Fancy dress and ties were required and all that? Killian came with me.”  
  
“As a date?” Mary Margaret asks.   
  
“What else would he come as?”   
  
“Your friend,” she suggests. “Like he’s done for the last three years.”   
  
“Yeah, but there was no ripping off of each other’s clothes those other years! It was—passionate! Heated, even. No, God—Ruby stop laughing, this isn’t funny.”

Ruby holds up a hand in what Emma can only assume is surrender, but then she notices just how much her shoulders are shaking and she’s definitely trying not to laugh so, like, game on or whatever. “No, no, definitely not funny,” Ruby agrees. The words wobble out of her. “But like—heated, honestly. You and Jones?”  
  
“We can be heated! We can be hot! For each other, specifically.”   
  
“Em, this is almost getting embarrassing.”

“I will kick you,” Emma warns. “Like, really hard.”  
  
Mary Margaret rests a hand on Emma’s shoulder before she can take another step forward, an expression that’s in the realm of motherly and comforting and it might be the worst thing in the world. At least on Long Island. Possibly the Tri-State area. 

“This is not embarrassing,” Mary Margaret promises. “That’s not a word we agreed on.”  
  
Emma growls. “So it was preordained?”   
  
“We just want to make sure you’re happy. And that you and Killian don’t feel like you need to—” Another shrug. One of them is going to dislocate a shoulder sooner or later. “Put on airs for us. It’s just us. No judging.”   
  
“Say that again,” Emma challenges.

Mary Margaret exhales. “We’re not judging. We only have your best interests at heart, both of you. And it’s not as if you two have ever really showed you were interested.”  
  
Of all the things that could possibly be the last straw in this conversation, Emma is almost pleasantly surprised to realize it’s that particular sentence. 

She rolls Mary Margaret’s hand off her. 

“We are constantly touching each other,” she hisses, a little concerned by the red that’s started to cloud the edge of her vision. “He is always putting his arm around me. I sat on his leg when we were drinking before!”  
  
“But that’s just normal,” Ruby argues, and Emma genuinely has no idea what she does at that. It hurts, at least, the sound that races out of her and the burst of heat in her chest, which can’t be healthy and presumably is what, finally, draws Killian to the kitchen. 

His eyes sweep the scene as soon as he steps on the linoleum floor, one side of his mouth ticking up when he meets Emma’s gaze. 

“You ok, love?”  
  
“No,” she sneers. “Can you tell these idiots that we’re into each other?”   
  
“Wait, what?”   
  
Emma waves both her hands again, snarling at her friends. Ruby barely blinks. “We were only telling Emma that we, uh—”   
  
“—They don’t think we’re dating,” Emma finishes. Killian freezes. From the top of his head to his obviously sock-covered feet. 

He stops and stares and stares some more and then—

He laughs. Loudly. Uproariously. Head thrown back and shoulders heaving, desperately trying to catch his breath while the laughter bounces off the kitchen walls and settles into Emma’s soul, which is admittedly a little melodramatic, but this has been the strangest fifteen minutes of her life and she still really wants to kiss her boyfriend. 

It’s nice to know she still has her priorities straight, at least. 

“What is happening right now?” Mary Margaret murmurs, as Killian wipes away the tears that have fallen on his cheeks. 

“Sucks not to know, doesn’t it?” Emma snaps.   
  
“Wait, wait,” Ruby says quickly, “is this laughter at our question or at the prospect of dating Emma, because if it's the second one, that kind of seems like a dick move, Jones.”   
  
Killian scoffs, and it only takes three more steps for him to be in Emma’s space with his arm around her shoulder and his lips ghosting over the top of her hair. She widens her eyes at Ruby. “It is not laughter at the prospect of dating my girlfriend, no,” Killian drawls. “Are you double checking on us, Lucas?”   
  
“You guys can’t be dating.”   
  
“Says who?”   
  
“Us,” Ruby cries, nearly falling off the counter when her limbs flail several different directions. “That’s—M’s you’ve got to back me up on this! It’s weird.”   
  
“Weird,” Killian echoes. “That I’m dating the person I like?”   
  
“When did you start liking Emma?”   
  
“I don’t think I have to tell you that.”   
  
Ruby lets out a triumphant sound, like she’s won something and Emma can’t imagine what the prize is in this situation, but it might be the genuinely ridiculous amount of alcohol Will and Phillip have seemingly just gotten back with. 

“Where is everyone?” Will yells, what looks like an actual crate propped up on his hip. He narrows his eyes when he takes in the kitchen and the half-finished dishes, gaze darting Ruby’s direction. 

She curses. Loudly. 

“Not exactly subtle, is he?” Killian mutters, mostly to Emma. She turns into his side, curling both arms around his middle, so he’ll kiss the top of her hair again, but maybe to prove a point and Mary Margaret may never stop looking at her feet. 

“You guys going to be weird about this?” Will asks. “Now that we know you’re faking?”  
  
“No one is faking anything,” Emma objects.   
  
“Sure you’re not. Did you come up with a relationship backstory on your way up her? That’s kind of rom-com, don’t you think, Em?”   
  
“We didn’t have to come up with anything! We are living the rom-com.”   
  
“You and Jones?”   
  
“Me and Killian.”   
  
“You know you guys only have one bed in your room,” Ruby chips in, apparently missing some form of self-preservation. “Is that going to be a problem?”  
  
Killian shakes his head. “We’re definitely going to use that one bed. Thoroughly.”   
  
“My brother is here,” Emma mumbles. He smirks at her. “But,” she adds, “we’re definitely going to use that bed. With the condoms that we brought.”   
  
Mary Margaret makes a strangled noise, Will chuckling while Ruby continues to curse and David demands to know _why isn’t anyone giving me something to drink so I can fuck up Wario right now?_

“He brings up a very good point, Swan,” Killian grins, and Mary Margaret sounds like she’s choking now. Serves her right. 

Emma hums. “Is that even how the game works?”  
  
“Only one way to find out, right?”   
  
“Something like that, for sure.”   
  
He flashes another smile, eyes bright enough that for half a second Emma forgets everything that’s happened in that kitchen and she still has dishes to watch, pressing up on her toes as soon as Killian ducks his head. 

Their friends boo. 

She flips them all off. 

And it’s honestly not bad for the rest of the night — there are more discussions of how to properly play Mario Party and an almost alarming amount of alcohol, most of it horribly mixed by Aurora and Ruby, but no one mentions _fake dating_ again, and Emma’s grateful for that. Until they all traipse upstairs to go to bed and there’s really only one bed and both Regina and Mary Margaret stare just a little too long before Emma closes the door behind her. 

It takes her about fourteen seconds to get mad again.   
  
“Go ahead,” Killian chuckles, dropping onto the edge of that one bed so he can tug off his socks. She seriously cannot cope with his socks. 

“I’m sorry, what?”  
  
“I know you’ve been waiting to curse them up one side and down the other, so let’s have your worst.”   
  
“It’s stupid that you know that.” 

He nods, lips pursed as he crooks a finger at her. Emma huffs, but moves into the space between his legs almost immediately, Killian’s hands on her hips and hers on his shoulders and she takes far too much joy in how quickly his eyelashes start to flutter. His head falls to her stomach. Top-tier, peak relationship status. 

“I know everything,” Killian mumbles, mostly into her shirt. “And I know that it’s ridiculous they think we aren’t in—”  
  
She doesn’t dare breathe when he cuts himself off, both of them dancing around something big and important and it’s almost an appropriate amount of time, but Emma is _Emma_ and she doesn’t want to fuck this up and maybe that was why she’d been so nervous to admit that Killian Jones is ridiculously good looking. 

Like almost painfully good looking. 

She cards her fingers through his hair. 

“I have an idea,” he says. 

“Yeah?”  
  
“I think we should go all in. All those romantic comedy tropes Scarlet was talking about. Lean in to every single one of them.”   
  
“How many tropes could there possibly be?”   
  
Killian makes a noncommittal noise, glancing up which is really unfair because his eyelashes are almost offensively long. “We’ll make a list.”   
  
“Just like that?”   
  
“Just like that,” he repeats. “Why? You have other things to do tonight?”   
  
“Oh, you’re a menace.”   
  
He nips at her hip, Emma jumping and possibly giggling. Killian’s eyes are definitely getting bluer. Maybe it’s the lighting in that room. Their room. Together. 

She can’t believe he brought so many socks. 

“That will be thing number one, I think,” Killian said. “Blatant and obvious flirting.”  
  
“You don’t think we flirt enough?”   
  
“Not constantly because we’re not animals, but—you know, could probably do with a bit more. Tell you that I think you’re stunning? Regularly?” Emma gags. Killian keeps going. “Bewitching? That I’m fairly certain your hair has magical properties? Regarding its ability to reflect light?”   
  
“Oh, yeah, use that one,” she laughs, and it’s not very hard to get him to lay next to her on the bed. Which may actually be made of feathers, if its overall level of comfort is any indication. “What else, then?”   
  
“Endearments, naturally.”   
  
“Naturally.”   
  
“And, uh—” He clicks his tongue, eyebrows shifting in a way that undoubtedly defies the laws of gravity. “PDA.”

“Say PDA again,” Emma challenges. Killian blushes better than Mary Margaret, she thinks. Presumably because she wants to kiss Killian more than she wants to kiss Mary Margaret. 

There’s been a disappointing lack of kissing so far. 

“Public displays of affection,” Killian says, pausing between every word until Emma’s whole body shakes with the force of her laughter. “I’m going to constantly touch you.”  
  
“Could be worse.”   
  
“Oh yeah?”   
  
“I mean—” Emma drags her fingers up his side, shifting his shirt until she reaches skin and the plane of his stomach and—   
  
“Shit, stop that,” Killian grumbles. “It tickles.”   
  
Emma’s eyes widen. In perfect tandem with what feels like a rather large expansion of her heart, another burst of heat that isn’t quite as jarring as it was in the kitchen. And Killian shifts half an inch backwards. “Don’t,” he warns, but Emma swipes her tongue across her teeth. “Swan, c’mon, that’s—”   
  
Pouncing is a very ugly word, but Emma is way too busy discovering other areas of her boyfriend's body and Killian stops talking rather quickly. As soon as her tongue is in his mouth. 

And they do make a list. An actual physical list, with bullet points and a plan, that Killian keeps in his pocket because Emma doesn’t have pockets in her dresses and it’s easier for his hand to squeeze her knee if she wears dresses. 

That’s bullet point number six. 

There are seventeen. 

It becomes something of a game for them — Killian making sure to call Emma _love_ at the end of what seems like every sentence, while she alternates between _babe_ and _sweetheart_ , but that second one kind of sets her teeth on edge and, one time, on Saturday afternoon while they’re picking badminton teams because that’s something they do on this weekend, he calls her—

“C’mon, darling,” Killian says, slinging an arm around Emma’s shoulders. “We’re going to absolutely destroy Nolan and Nolan.”

Every one of their friends groan. 

Emma very nearly passes out. 

The word ricochets off her soul, or something less ridiculous. Even after Killian and David finish debating the proper terminology for the shuttle-thing. She’s never been a _darling_ before. Darling is for committed relationships and longevity and _happily ever after_ and her racquet nearly flies out of her hand when she tries to return Mary Margaret’s serve. 

“You ok, Swan?” Killian asks, and good that’s good. A much-needed return to normal. 

Emma nods. She can’t seem to do much else. 

Somehow they win the match. David decrees it’s called a match. 

And Killian seems to take the public displays of affection fairly seriously — pulling Emma onto his legs when they sit around the fire on Saturday night, nosing at the back of her neck or that one spot just above her shoulder blade that makes her shiver. She almost constantly has her fingers in his hair, tracing idle patterns with her nails. There are absent-minded kisses and kisses that make her toes curl, standing on sand or in the hallway or...well, anywhere really.

It’s something almost close to wonderful, which isn’t really a change of pace for Emma and Killian as a couple, but this level of couple’dom is—

“You’re laughing,” he accuses, but the words get lost between their mouths and there's not much space between their mouths. 

Emma shakes her head. “I’m having fun.”  
  
“That was the point of this weekend. It always is.”

“Yeah, but I mean—” She grits her teeth, neves creeping up her spine and taking root in the back of her skull, and she hates that it happens. Emma is the worst kind of pessimist. Or, rather the best kind, depending on how you look at it. 

“I like you too,” Killian says.

“Presumptuous.”  
  
“Tell me that’s now how the sentence was going to end, then.”   
  
“Well, ok yeah, but—this is just...being full-on relationship, it’s been good, right?”   
  
“Are you double checking?”   
  
“A little,” Emma admits. “I—this was the plan, and I know it was the plan. That we were going to stop trying to hide and—”

“—I really don’t think we were ever good at hiding it.”  
  
“Tell that to the rest of our friends. Mary Margaret and Ruby staged an intervention. It’s...I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m glad you were willing to prove how stupid into me you are.”

Killian barks out a laugh, tongue finding the corner of his mouth. “Yeah, that’s totally what I am.”  
  
“I knew it.”

Those same friends, however, don’t seem to get the memo. 

Maybe they need new friends. 

“I don’t know,” Will says, halfway through a Sunday afternoon BBQ that could feed a small army. “I’m still calling shenanigans.”  
  
“Shenanigans,” Emma echoes. 

“You heard me the first time. It seems like you’re trying too hard.”  
  
“To be in a relationship?”   
  
“Yuh huh,” Will nods, flipping more than one burgers at the same time. “You see that? That was impressive as fuck.”   
  
“You’re a poet,” Killian mutters. He must have some kind of Emma-focused sixth sense too, because she feels an arm curl around her middle before she can get into any sort of pacing groove, grunting when he pulls her back against his chest. 

And kisses behind her ear. 

Regina quirks an eyebrow. “I don’t know, actually. There has been a pretty good amount of eye making, even before we got here.”

“I don’t make eyes,” Emma argues.   
  
“No, but he does.”   
  
Killian’s cheek brushes the side of Emma’s head when he nods. “That’s true, I’ve been making eyes for quite some time.”

“See,” Regina says, “This is—if this is fake, it’s a serious commitment to the cause.”  
  
“The cause of kissing my boyfriend?” Emma challenges.

“Yeah, that one. Ok, pop quiz. Killian, when was your first kiss with Emma?”  
  
He doesn’t tense. He doesn’t flinch. His hand might tighten a little, but Emma chooses to believe that’s actually a positive and she’s very glad for it. If only because that’s the main reason she stays upright. 

“Junior year of college,” Killian replies.

Will drops the tongs. It’s patently absurd. 

“Hold on, when?” David demands. He’s already half standing when Mary Margaret levels him with a look, flopping back into the plastic chair with enough force it nearly breaks. “Junior year of college. I thought you started dating a few months ago.”  
  
“Yeah, we did.”   
  
“And?”

“And,” Killian repeats. “We’d gone out, you and Mary Margaret left early. So I walked Emma back to her apartment, it was raining. We hit all of those rom-com tropes. She even had my jacket on.”  
  
Emma can’t catch her breath. Which is really ridiculous since she’s not moving, but she was always fairly positive she was the only one counting this as their first kiss and—

“You were drunk,” she cries. “You can’t possibly remember this!”  
  
Mary Margaret audibly gasps. That’s more ridiculous than Emma’s breathing issues. 

She twists against Killian’s chest, meeting his steady gaze with something that can only be described as ever-increasing and seemingly inevitable insanity. He smirks. 

The bastard. 

“Trust me,” he says, “I’ve spent way longer than I’d be willing to admit remembering just that. You took your shoes off as soon as we got into the lobby.”  
  
“Because they hurt my feet.”   
  
“Mmhm.”   
  
“What happened after that?” Aurora asks sharply, elbows on her knees and chin on her hands and no one has noticed that some of the hot dogs are starting to burn. 

“She’s a very good kisser,” Killian replies. Easy as that. Emma’s back to not breathing. “Told me it was nice that I walked her home, I said I probably deserved some kind of reward, she glared at me, I waited very patiently and she—”  
  
Emma remembers the rest. She doesn't need to hear it. She reenacts it, instead. Her hands fly to his shirt, fingers curling into fabric that’s different than it was when they were twenty and buzzed on alcohol that was only marginally worse than what they’ve spent all weekend drinking and Killian is absolutely smiling when she kisses him.

The bastard. 

Part two. 

And she resolutely refuses to acknowledge any sounds from the peanut gallery, pushing up on bare feet so it’s easier to sling an arm over his shoulder and push her fingers into his hair. He tilts his head, lets his tongue sweep along her lips and she might sigh, but he might also groan and he definitely closes his eyes. 

Emma’s always liked that about him.   
  
Killian closes his eyes when he kisses her — like he’s uninterested in anything else, like anything else means less than nothing when he can nose at Emma’s cheek or drop his mouth along the curve of her jaw. It also gives her half a second to stare at the overall length of his eyelashes, so it’s kind of a win-win for her. 

He’s just as out of breath as she is when they pull apart, color in his cheeks and Emma’s heart threatens to burst out of her ribcage. 

That’s probably not covered under incidentals either. 

She’s got to stop thinking so violently. Especially about her own body. 

Will whistles. 

“You guys suck,” Emma announces, and that’s not the first thing she planned on saying, but nothing has really gone according to plan that weekend and she has _thoughts_ on that. 

Patent pending. 

“First of all,” she says, holding up one finger. Will is trying very hard not to laugh. Ruby isn’t trying. “Killian and I have been dating for months. Genuinely months. And, ok, yeah we kissed one time in college, but we didn’t start dating for awhile, and that—” 

Emma is still holding up her finger when she turns again. Killian’s smirk is going to stay permanently etched on his face. “That was kind of stupid, wasn’t it?”  
  
“Your words, not mine,” he chuckles. 

“I definitely thought you were good looking in college.”  
  
“I desperately wanted to date you in college.”   
  
“No shit.”   
  
“What is happening right now?” Phillip yells. Emma doesn’t have an answer for that. It’s less disappointing than it was on Friday night. 

“No shit,” Killian repeats. “You were—I don’t know, this force of nature. But you were also David’s sister and—”  
  
“—She’s still my sister,” David interrupts. Regina throws something at him. It might honestly be her sandal.

Emma doesn’t bother double checking. She’s rather busy swooning, after all.

Killian kisses the bridge of her nose before he continues. “You never take anyone’s garbage, love. Mine included and that wasn’t really why I was stupid into you, but it was a big part at the start, and then we kept hanging out and you’re—” She doesn’t mind when he shrugs. Probably because of the previously discussed swooning. Honestly, Emma is swooning so bad. “You’re the smartest person I know. And stronger than anyone else, on some existential level.”  
  
God, she hopes she doesn’t start to cry. 

That’d be kind of lame. 

And, somehow, there is more. 

“I worry about you, you know. Every time you leave my apartment and go save someone. It’s—I count minutes from when you text me that you’re on the train until I hear the lock click. It’s insane. Might be affecting my blood pressure, really.”  
  
“She has a key,” Ruby whispers. Not very well, but something about the thought Emma assumes. “She really has a key?”   
  
“I really have a key,” Emma answers. “I wasn’t kidding about spending multiple nights a week at his apartment.”   
  
“We could probably do something about that,” Killian adds. Will whistles again. 

Emma’s jaw drops. That’s kind of disappointing, really. She wishes she had some kind of sweeping something to respond with — romance on another level of romantic-type expectations, but she’s still her and she’s still a little pissed they haven’t been dating since their junior year in college. 

“Em, Em,” Ruby presses, “I’m pretty sure he’s asking you to move in with him.”  
  
Killian hums. “She’s annoying, but she’s right.”   
  
Ruby sticks her tongue out.   
  
“But, but,” Emma stammers, “that wasn’t on the list.”   
  
“You guys made a list?” Regina balks.   
  
“None of you believed us! Which, honestly friendship demerits. Negative friendship standing. We are a good couple, and we like hanging out and we’d been hanging out forever, and this just kind of...happened. It should have happened before, maybe, but our first date was getting ice cream in the Village because none of you will go to the Village with me and I—Killian always will.”   
  
“That’s kind of how boyfriend’ing works,” he chuckles.   
  
“Is that a word?”   
  
“Absolutely not,” Mary Margaret says. “Should we apologize now?”   
  
“Probably,” Emma sighs. “Because it’s—none of this has been fake, and we’ve been on relationship overdrive for the last forty-eight hours and I mean...is it so shocking that we could be in a relationship?”

Silence. 

None of them answer, and Killian is still staring at Emma because, she realizes rather belatedly, she hasn’t actually told him she wants to move into his apartment with a bed that’s even more comfortable than the one here or that she also counts down the minutes because she sleeps better with him than she has in years, so naturally she tilts her head up and—

“I love you,” Emma says. Killian’s eyes bug. “And I think I have for a really long time, but we were always friends and—”  
  
“—That’s not going to change, love.”   
  
“Well, yeah, that’s how good relationships work. Are you just going to gloss over the sentiment?”   
  
“Absolutely not,” Killian mumbles, gruffer than usual. And probably because half of the letters get lost in more kissing, a distinct arch to Emma’s back when he actually dips her like some goddamn romantic comedy. 

Mary Margaret might take a picture. 

Emma kind of hopes she does. It’d look good in a frame on the wall. Their wall. 

“I’d like to move into your apartment,” Emma says, and she definitely giggles that time. There’s no way around it, not when Killian’s lips drag along the side of her neck and pepper every inch of her face. 

Several people awwww out loud. 

As they should, really. 

“I love you too,” Killian says. 

“Ok, good.”  
  
“Good.”

There’s more kissing after that. As there should be, really. Part two.  
  
“So, uh,” Will says, and he’s picked up the tongs at some point, “you guys want celebratory hamburgers or…”   
  
“If you don’t put cheese on my burger, I’ll throw your fucking tongues in the ocean,” Emma guarantees. 

Killian crows. Or something. It’s nice, and that’s really all she cares about. “That’s my girlfriend.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Ruby groans. “We’ve heard. Do we toast to the happy couple?”  
  
“Absolutely,” David says, reaching into the cooler to grab wine coolers. Like they’re juniors in college. They toast several times. 

And Emma doesn’t sleep much that night, but that’s something she’s willing to concede. Especially when Killian lets her pick the music on the drive back the next morning. 

Like any good relationship. 

**Author's Note:**

> Listen, this is wholly for and because of Devon. Who regularly listens to me complain about work. So instead of doing work this afternoon, I wrote this. 
> 
> Come hang out on [Tumblr](http://welllpthisishappening.tumblr.com/) if you're down


End file.
